When testing an iPhone X a few years ago, I was struck by the novelty of not having the battery percentage in the upper right corner of the screen. Apple decided to remove that percentage and show it only when activating Control Center due to the notches. I had been watching it decrease every day for almost a decade on my mobile, it was the first setting I looked for every time I renewed it.
As a consequence, the first few days I instinctively opened the Control Center to see how much life my iPhone had left. The first days, then it was less and less, and after two weeks… I realized that I really didn’t care one bit if the battery was at 73% or 68%. It will not run out sooner because I do not see the exact figure and I already know how long the autonomy of my mobile lasts on average.
A number more irrelevant than useful
Some time later I went back to what used to be my iPhone 7 Plus, where you could show the battery percentage for as long as you want. As usual, the first thing I did when restoring the device was to go to Settings> Battery to activate the option, but before doing so I thought about it a bit. Why did I need to activate the battery percentage? What does it really contribute and how can it help me to know exactly how much battery is left? I didn’t activate itfor the following reasons:
- The percentage is one more number, a data that is loaded in our brain every time we look at the iPhone (and it is many times in a day), it is a small load that in combination with others only makes us overload our brain with irrelevant data.
- The battery icon already indicates quite accurately how much battery is left, being able to differentiate if there is 44% or 47% left is not going to change your life, not even the way you use the iPhone at that moment.
- When knowing the remaining battery is more important, iOS already takes care of showing it to you: either through the red icon when there is less than 20% left, or through the Battery Saving mode that activates the percentage.
- If you really need to see the remaining battery in percentage, it’s as easy as activating the Battery widget.
We must also take into account that over time we have seen how the autonomy of the iPhone has grown, especially in the latest generation of the terminal. We have reached a point where a general use of that iPhone guarantees autonomy for the whole day. And in the case of the iPhone 13 Pro Max and the iPhone 14 Pro Max, for two.
How to Hide Battery Percentage on iPhone
Changing the iPhone battery percentage to show or hide it is easy. Just open the ‘Battery’ section in iPhone Settings:
And then finally turn off the ‘Battery Percentage’ option:
In the end it is a matter of removing irrelevant problems from day to day. It is a number that may give you more precision, but that precision does not give you anything more than constant stress to save or have enough battery until you get home. It will run out the same, with or without the percentage on your screen. If you’re using an iPhone that still shows you the battery percentage (like the iPhone SE), try the test yourself.
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